Busy, Busy, Busy

This year presents a stark contrast to 2011.

Last year, I was pretty much bone idle, wasted my free time, earned very little money, frittered away all my redundancy payout and then raided a good chunk of my savings.

This year, at least over the last few months, I've been kept pretty busy - a nine-month contract that got cut down to a couple of weeks, bumped up to a couple of months, then bumped up to a twelve-month contract before finally being cancelled entirely has led to several more short temping stints with the same company. Another company took me on for odd two- or three-day holiday cover placements, and has now booked me for two months at two days a week, with occasional longer bookings during their crunch-times leading up to Christmas. Just this last week, I worked a full week between both companies.

And it's hugely enjoyable, too... Not only is the work itself fun, but being in an office again, with such different people, is a massive improvement on my self-imposed hermit-like existence in my flat. It's good to be working on practical things, and it's nice to feel appreciated - and be thanked for my work, which is a stark contrast to my last full-time job - by teams of people who describe me as "a calming influence".

And, yes, some of these people are salespeople.

Strangely, though, I spend some of my evenings feeling bitter and hard-done-by because I actually have to wake up at a specific time the following morning, and actually go to work. The terrible hardship that is the (surprisingly efficient) Metropolitan Line, actually putting in a day's work at the mill... Some evenings, I actually seem to forget that, were I not working, I'd almost certainly be wasting my days and getting nothing of any consequence done, and then getting depressed and frustrated with myself because there's so much else I could be doing.

When morning comes, however (and once I've convinced myself to get the fuck out of bed), all my enthusiasm returns. Sometimes I find myself smiling to myself on the way into work, because I know that whatever the day may bring, it's going to be challenging and fun. Rather than looking at the clock and wondering where the last two hours went, I'll be thinking "hey, I managed to get that done in decent time... I wonder what I'm doing next..." and, come 5.30, I look back on the day and think "that was a good day."

I've been a bit disorganised lately... Failed to produce an invoice for my first 'week' at one job, and only handed over last week's invoice for the other yesterday. Neglected my food shopping last weekend, and so had to make do with shop-bought sarnies and things for a couple of days last week. I'm aiming to actually sort out next week's food shopping either today or tomorrow because, while I'm only certain of work for the first three days next week, there's a good chance I'll be called in to one of the companies for Thursday/Friday as well.

If all this work keeps up, I might actually venture to this winter's conventions... Though the London Expo is out because I'll be in Wales...